Why Arsenal fans have no-one else to blame except themselves for this mess!

The way the Arsenal fans treated this great man was disgusting…

Arsene Wenger left Arsenal in the summer of 2018, which was only 3 short years ago. Since then, Arsenal have been in absolute free fall.

In Arsene’s final season, we finished 6th in the Premier League and reached the semi-finals of the Europa League. Things we would probably kill for now.

The final seasons of Arsene’s reign were uncomfortable to watch and at the time, I was always an Arsene supporter. He had single-handedly dragged our great club to the peak of the Premier League, when the only side that was winning was Manchester United. Clubs like Newcastle, Leeds United, Liverpool, Chelsea and Tottenham were all fighting to compete in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, but it was Arsenal who would offer the biggest threat and would even topple the red side of Manchester a few times.

Arsene also had great ambition and vision, which lead to the move to The Emirates Stadium. This was to ensure we could compete with the biggest teams when it came to spending money in the transfer market – and that’s certainly true as Arsenal have spent around £400 million alone on transfer fees since Arsene Wenger left the club. So we’re in a healthy position financially.

But while we have the funds to compete, we are is a right mess. 3 games into the new season, we sit bottom of the league, with our friends Tottenham Hotspur sitting at the top. Bad times indeed.

But how did we get to this? I guarantee that if Arsene Wenger was still at the club, we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in now.

Arsene commanded great respect in the dressing room but also in the board room. None of this mess with the board, Edu and the men at the top who have since left would have happened. We signed dead wood like David Luiz and Cedric because Edu is mates with their agent! We’ve had the money but signed absolute duds just so we could line the pockets of Edu’s pals. It’s a disgrace.

On the pitch, it’s not much better. I like Mikel Arteta, I really do, but why on earth did we bring him to the club? This is a man with ZERO management experience.

You can laugh and joke all you like about Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, Frank Lampard, Steven Gerrard, Wayne Rooney and other ex-professionals that have tried their hand at management – but at least they have SOME management experience! It’s absolutely insane to think that someone who has never managed in their life would come into the club and improve the situation. But that’s a reflection on the people running the club.

And I think the biggest issue right now is we have no identity. When you watch any other team in the Premier League, after 5 minuets of watching them you understand how they’re trying to play – there’s a game plan and method to their patterns of play. With Arsenal, I don’t know what I’m watching, seriously. What are we trying to do? We’re not direct, we’re not playing through the wings, we’re not playing through the lines – what instructions is Mikel Arteta giving the players? Because they look completely clueless when they’re on the pitch!

At least with Arsene Wenger, we had a plan. It was attack, attack, attack, and although it left us exposed, at least we scored goals! Now we have ZERO goal threat and just concede goals.

I’ve always said with Arsene Wenger we would score goals and concede goals. With Unai Emery, we scored less goals but conceded less goals. Now, with Arteta, we don’t score any goals and just concede loads of them. So in 3 seasons we’ve dramatically gone downhill.

We are currently 20th in the Premier League after 3 games, and there’s a long way to go and we probably won’t be there at the end of the season. But unless things change, and quickly, then we’re not going to get much higher in the league!

 

Arsene Wenger predicted this would happen… and why the Premier League & UEFA are to blame!

The overreaction to the formation of the European Super League is absolutely ridiculous. It’s similar to the hysteria about Brexit and scaring people into leaving the EU.

It’s a model used all over the sporting world. People need to stop being so naive – Arsene Wenger said 10 years ago that there would be a European Super League by 2022.

The argument about greed is utterly moronic. That boat sailed a long time ago with the start of the Premier League, and it set back lower league sides for decades while making PL sides richer and richer.

And Arsene predicted that this would happen directly because of the behaviour or the Premier League and UEFA.

The Premier League let clubs like Chelsea and Manchester City have owners that had questionable backgrounds come in and splash obscene amounts of money so that they could get the best players and increase the viewership worldwide. You realise the PL make insane money from worldwide TV rights don’t you?

And UEFA? They pretended to implemented FFP (Financial Fair Play) but let the richest clubs (Manchester City, PSG, etc.) break these rules time and time again without punishment.

Why? Because UEFA are corrupt and again, all they want is the best players so they have the highest viewing figures possible.

This is something which has been on the cards for a long long time, and the hypocrisy and outrage from these so called pundits is laughable.

Ever since the Premier League was formed in 1992 all football has ever been about is money. So why are people shocked when years later, a money driven decision is made by the top clubs.

You reap what you sow and this is the result.

 

The REAL reason why Mesut Özil has been axed from Arsenal

“What’s going on here?!”

For longer than I care to remember, the Mesut Özil saga has been going on and on, which hasn’t made Arsenal or the player look particularly great by any stretch.

It all came to head in the last week or so, first when Özil was excluded from the Europa League squad. The reaction to that was so-so, and a section of Arsenal fans weren’t happy with that news.

But then it all kicked off on Tuesday when he was was surprisingly left out of the Premier League club on Tuesday. The fan reaction was intense to say the least!

There seems to be a lot of anger, confusion and debate as to why Mesut Özil has been frozen out of the club, and here I explain why this has happened.

First of all, I want to get out of the way the ludicrous claim made on Twitter (and something that seems to have gained some traction) that Özil has been left out because of his comments regarding human rights, Muslims and China. As pointed out by many online, he played for 3 months after making these comments and played started all 10 games under Arteta immediately after making these statements, before the COVID-19 pandemic hit. The BBC Sport website have a good piece on why the political stance of Özil is not the reason why he has been left out, and how it’s a smokescreen for the real reasons.

Football is a very emotive topic but let’s just sit back and take a look at the facts.

During Arsene Wenger’s reign, he had problems with Özil and regularly had to leave him out of the squad. Remember when he was missing on match days? Özil was given time off by Arsene during the season if he didn’t fancy playing!

Then under Unai Emery, he had the same issues. But instead of granting Özil time off whenever he wanted, he demanded the player give 110% and give everything for the team. What resulted was a power struggle between player and manager, and after Emery left him out the fans turned against him which ended up with the Spaniard losing his job.

He played most games under Freddie’s short tenure, but even then he didn’t start every game.

Then we come to Mikel Arteta. There are many reasonable explanations and justifications why Mesut Özil has been dropped so I’ll try to go through them all.

Firstly let’s consider the history between Arteta and Özil. They played together for 3 seasons and did very well during that time, winning the FA Cup twice. If anyone knows how good Özil is first hand, it will be the Arsenal manager because he played week in week out alongside him! Arteta would have seen him in training, on the pitch and in the dressing room on an almost daily basis.

And that is what Arsenal fans have a problem with understanding – the talent of Mesut Özil. Hs ability is something no-one has ever disputed. He has the talent, the issue is his effort, application and dedication. And this is the point most Arsenal fans seem to be completely missing.

Mikel Arteta is a manager that has very specific requirements and needs from his players. And one of them is 100% complete dedication and commitment to the cause. He has a specific way of playing the game and that is something he will not deviate from – and nor should he. You’ve heard about these ‘non-negotiables’ time and time again from him, and these are real. You either sign up with Arteta’s vision or you don’t. And with Aubameyang and most of the squad, they believe in his plans for making Arsenal a real force again.

What Arteta is doing, and what he has to do, is show strong leadership and that is what every Arsenal fan should be wanting and quite frankly, hoping for. He has come in with his own ideas and is willing to stick to them. That’s what any good manager needs to do.

Özil has clearly not adhered or agreed to these important principles and the only thing Arteta can do as a strong leader that the team will ultimately respect is to live and die by his beliefs.

Mikel Arteta cannot allow to be seen to give Özil any leeway whatsoever because he will seem weak to the rest of the squad and that is something he cannot allow to do. That’s what started the demise for Unai Emery and if we want to improve as a team and a club, that is unthinkable.

So here we are, it’s that simple.

The reason why Özil has been dropped is because he isn’t putting in the graft and hard work required by a Mikel Arteta side.

Can you imagine what would happen if Arteta let Özil get away with murder and gave him allowances time and time again, like Arsene Wenger did? He would quickly lose respect in the dressing room and the team would end up in a downward spiral.

The rest is just smoke and mirrors that the media love to lap up. First it was the fact that Özil refused a pay cut, then it was the messages regarding Uighur Muslims in China and then we had Özil offering to pay Gunnersaurus’s wages – it’s just a big circus which is just boring now.

The reason why this is overblown compared to if it was another players is because of Özil’s popularity. He has 22.3 million followers on Instagram, and 25.1 million followers on Twitter. This guy is an a global superstar, and along with it literally has millions upon millions of loyal supporters. So when the perception is that he’s been slighted or wronged, then millions of fans are going to be vocal about it.

It’s similar to Paul Pobga at Manchester United. Football merit has gone out of the window during his time there, and all that matters with him is not dedicating himself to the team and club, but selling merchandise, football boots and posting selfies on Instagram.

That is the world we live in today you just have to accept that some footballers aren’t footballers any more, but celebrities. We all know Özil’s activities outside of football, and rightly or wrongly those are more important to him.

I’ll end on this note. Mikel Arteta is coming into a football club which is in dire straits, has dropped from being a Top 4 club to a mid table club under Unai Emery – the fans are angry and the team is not performing. Do you think in your right mind someone like Arteta, who has regularly shown to be a strong leader and a man who knows his own mind, would drop Mesut Özil if he was absolutely bossing it in training, showing he’s the best player and dominating training sessions? If he was giving absolutely everything in training and being an example to others? Behave yourself.

If Özil was truly an asset to the team and could make us better, he would be one of the first names on Mikel Arteta’s team sheet, guaranteed.

 

Why Arsenal suffer more serious injuries in the Premier League than any other team – and why it will never end!

“Are you going to do anything about this mate?”

In the early 90’s, George Graham’s Arsenal were in full flow – we had the best defence in the country, lead by Tony Adams, and were a tough side that would be hard to beat. Our defence consisted of Mr Arsenal, alongside Steve Bould (or Martin Keown), Lee Dixon and Nigel Winterburn.

When Arsene Wenger arrived in 1996, he inherited the famous back four and a squad that included Andy Linighan, Ray Parlour, John Hartson, Ian Wright and Dennis Bergkamp – all players who were warriors on the pitch and wouldn’t take any nonsense from anyone!

He then added Patrick Vieira and Emmanuel Petit, who were also players who had a presence and could fight on the pitch as well. We had success with these players, and more were added in the form of Marc Overmars, Thierry Henry, Robert Pires, Freddie Ljungberg, Ashley Cole, Lauren, Sol Campbell and Kolo Toure, all of whom were supremely talented but also warriors on the pitch and leaders of it.

But then we started the move to The Emirates and that’s when things changed.

Instead of playing incisive and devastating football, we started emulating the Barcelona style of play. And instead of buying ready-made winners, we started buying players who were more technically gifted on the ball – players like Cesc Fabregas, Alexander Hleb, Tomas Rosicky, Abou Diaby, Samir Nasri and Santi Cazorla.

And I’m not complaining – with these types of players we played some really fantastic football which was a joy to watch. But the problem was Arsene was striving for beautiful, technical football in a league which just didn’t suit it.

We would win most of our games by running teams off the park with our excellent use of space, beautiful passing and lovely movement. We would score 3 or 4 goals a game most of the time, sweeping away the opposition – but this only worked against the lower teams in the league – and that is were the problem started.

Our style of play was based on a high level of technical ability, and against teams 5th and below it worked a treat. They didn’t know how to handle us and most of the time we would win. Our game relied on excellent offence and less emphasis on defence, which again is fine against most teams in the league, but not against the Top 4 sides.

Which is why we constantly finished 4th in the Premier League for a period of around 12 years. But the problem during those 12 years was that the teams below the Top 4, who had previously struggled to beat us, resorted to the only tactic that worked – being physical.

If you’re playing a team like Arsenal who move the ball so well and keep a high level of possession, then teams figured out that going toe-to-toe or even sitting back and hoping for the best just didn’t work. So teams started resorting to kicking us off the field, literally.

And the problem was, it worked.

And as more teams resorted to this “tactic”, the more the media portrayed Arsenal as a team of pansies, a team of players who didn’t “like it up them”. And this got worse and worse and worse, to the stage were it would be safe to say the treatment we received was close to assault.

The perception was that Arsenal players couldn’t handle the physical side of the game, and to get to them you just needed to “kick them off the park”. The ironic thing is this approach would probably work against any team, but for whatever reason, the media decided that Arsenal should be the team that deserved this focus, and once this narrative was set, it was hard to shake off.

In essence, Arsenal were effectively being punished for playing attractive football. We’ve had three players; Abou Diaby, Aaron Ramsey and Eduardo, who all suffered horrendous, career threatening injuries because of this false narrative. Abou Diaby and Eduardo were never the same again and their careers were ruined, and Aaron Ramsey took a long time to recover mentally from his ordeal.

And over the years, I remember horrific tackles on our players which were fortunate not to end in serious injury. In particular I remember really late challenges on Bacary Sagna, Theo Walcott, Ashley Cole, Edu, Jose Antonio Reyes and Robert Pires, and I’m sure there are many more.

Which other teams have suffered as many career threatening injuries like we have? I recall Liverpool having one when Djibril Cisse broke his leg against Blackburn, Luc Nilis suffering a broken leg while playing for Aston Villa, and Coventry City’s David Busst when they played Manchester United.

In terms of serious injuries caused by opponents, then we are well clear at the top of that table.

Read the following from Dave Kitson, about Tony Pulis who was the manager of Stoke when Aaron Ramsey suffered that horrific leg break:

‘Stoke manager Tony Pulis absolutely despised Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger, hated the way he played.

‘All week I had never seen a manager so desperate to win a game of football, it was bordering on out of control.

‘I remember Pulis pacing up and down shouting random things — this bundle of nervous energy blurting random swear words, trying to burn off his own nervous energy.

‘And, of course, the upshot of all of that energy was that we went over the top and it cost Ramsey a year of his career.’

‘It seemed to me that was as a direct result of players reacting to their manager’s over enthusiasm and buying into that whole thing and carrying out his instructions and crossing the line.

‘But it just went too far. His desperation to beat Wenger and justify his way of playing football. It crossed the line and went too far.’ 

That is how teams approach games against Arsenal, and if you think that teams are just being “a little physical” then you’re wrong.

There is this perception, narrative, call it whatever you want, that it’s okay to give Arsenal players a little more of a kick, or a little more of a shove, now and then because “it’s just Arsenal” and they just whine and cry about being pushed around.

And that’s what lead to the inexcusable foul on Bernd Leno by Neal Muapay yesterday. If you push someone that is running on the ground, they’ll just fall over. Anyone with half a brain cell knows that if you push someone who is airborne, then they are going to struggle to land safely. Go on, try it yourself. Jump in the air, and get a friend to shove you. See how you land and see whether it’s a pleasant experience – because I can guarantee you it’s not.

And the worst thing about all of this is the victim blaming. Are you serious?!

When Aaron Ramsey had his leg smashed into 100 pieces, everyone was feeling sorry for Ryan Shawcross. And the same thing happened when Martin Taylor ended Eduardo’s career – it is an absolute farce!

And yesterday, people were feeling sorry for Muapay. The logic of the whole situation is completely ridiculous!

It’s like driving your car down the street, with your eyes closed, and then when you run over 4 or 5 people, claiming you “didn’t mean to hurt anyone”.

As a footballer, you know exactly what you’re doing at any given time. There is no excuse for reckless behaviour. The way people try and justify these things is completely unbelievable – Ryan Shawcross ran into Aaron Ramsey at full pelt with a 100% reckless and dangerous challenge. Martin Taylor’s foot was studs up, well off the ground. And yesterday, the ball wasn’t even available to win yet Neal Muapay thought it was appropriate to push an airborne goalkeeper.

Until the false narrative in the media ends, which won’t be any time soon, then Arsenal players will be suffering serious injuries at the hands of the opposition time and time again.

And one last thought, how many times have Arsenal players suffered really bad injuries against teams in Europe?

Exactly.

 

Why Arsenal suffer more serious injuries in the Premier League than any other team – and why it will never stop

“Are you going to do anything about this mate?”

In the early 90’s, George Graham’s Arsenal were in full flow – we had the best defence in the country, lead by Tony Adams, and were a tough side that would be hard to beat. Our defence consisted of Mr Arsenal, alongside Steve Bould (or Martin Keown), Lee Dixon and Nigel Winterburn.

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